The slats of bed bases are generally fixed to the longitudinally-extending members of the frame of the base via endpieces which have housings for engaging their ends. These endpieces and the slats constitute the suspension means of the bed base and the stiffness thereof is selected on purchasing the bed base.
Nevertheless, depending on the weight and the morphology of the person using the bed, it may be useful to be able to modify the stiffness of each set of three slats.
This can be achieved in particular by adding tension-varying sliders. In general, tension-varying sliders include at least one through orifice through which a slat is threaded while the bed base is being assembled. The slider can be moved along the slat, thus enabling stiffness to be modified between the left-hand portion and the right-hand portion of the bed base. However, in order to remove the slider and place it on some other, more appropriate slat, it is necessary to take the base apart, which is an operation that is lengthy and difficult to perform by un-practiced users.
A tension-varying slider for a set of three slats of a bed base is also known, in particular from FR 2 666 973, which is constituted by two parallel upper slats placed in the plane on which the mattress rests, and a lower slat disposed substantially in the midplane between the two upper slats, the ends of slats being held via fixing means to the long sides of the frame of the bed base, which slider can easily be moved from one set of upper slats to another set without damaging the bed base. This is achieved by the fact that the means for fixing the slider to the upper slats include a structure for engaging the upper slats, which structure is constituted by a central core surmounting a suspension device and from which there extend two laterally-open housings for receiving the upper slats. The width of the slider is less than the spacing between two upper slats, thus making it possible during assembly to place the housings between two of said slats, and then to turn the slider through one-fourth of a turn about a vertical axis in order to fix it to the two upper slats at the desired location and on the desired set of three slats. Disassembly is performed in the reverse order, by turning the slider through one-fourth of a turn.
The width of the slider is thus limited by the spacing between two upper slats, so as to enable it to be assembled and disassembled. The width of the suspension means of the tension-varying slider that are designed to bear against the bottom slat is likewise limited by the spacing of two upper slats so as to enable it to be passed between said two slats for assembly or disassembly purposes.
Unfortunately, it can be useful for the width of the suspension means to be unlimited, where said width is measured in the long direction of the slats when the slider is in use.